Fishing in the Fall

by Bob Jensen Labor Day 2011 has come and gone.  For some folks, that marks the end of summer, and to some people that means it’s time to put the boat and their rods and reels in storage.  If they want to pull the plug on fishing in early September, that’s certainly their decision, but, [...]

Trolling Crankbaits

Our Outdoors By Nick Simonson In cooler waters of May and June the shallows can seem almost bare.  Nothing but the occasional waterboatman or roaming bluegill disturbs the water bordering shore.  Then as summer peaks, it seems the shallows are suddenly alive and teeming with small fish, as if the table was set for a [...]

Bass Fishing Technique

by Bob Jensen Largemouth bass can, at times, be pretty receptive to whatever bass fishing technique you might put in the water.  On some days they’ll eat pretty much anything you throw that’s appropriate for where they’re hanging out.  If you throw a bait that’s made to work in shallow water, and if the bass [...]

Snap Shot Ruler Review

Now you can prove the big one didn’t get away! The new SNAP SHOT RULER easily attaches to any fishing line, grip, or scale and measures fish length vertically so there is less handling of your prized catch. Accurate and photo friendly, this innovative ruler is great for anything from catch and release measurements to [...]

Shallow Bass Fishing

by Bob Jensen The month of June provides some of the best fishing of the year in many areas of the Midwest. One style of fishing that is popular and productive is chasing largemouth bass in shallow water. When the bass are done spawning, they’ll hang around the shallows for awhile. The females take a [...]

Time to Go Fishing

by Bob Jensen It used to be that anglers planned their fishing trips way in advance, and many still do. However, in conversations with resort owners and tourism people, more and more, anglers are becoming very spur-of-the-moment planners. They decide on Tuesday they want to go on a fishing trip for the upcoming weekend, maybe [...]

Catch More Fish This Year

By Bob Jensen Although the lakes across the northern section of the Midwest are still covered with ice, anglers are fishing almost everywhere else. There’s a feeling in the air that anglers are anxious to get fishing. They want to be on the water chasing whatever it is that they like to chase, and nothing [...]

Aquatic Nuisance Species

By Doug Leier It feels like just yesterday, when in fact it’s been over a year and a half, since the first official discovery of zebra mussels in the Red River watershed. First, these aquatic nuisance species were found established in a Minnesota lake upstream of the Red River. Then, to no one’s surprise, they [...]

Canadian Night Crawlers

With fishing season coming to light, it’s a great time to start looking into cheap bait.   You can now buy premium Canadian night crawlers for a lot cheaper then your local bait shop.  Canadian night crawlers are considered the highest quality, largest crawlers available.   One of our newest sponsors now has a special [...]

Blade Baits

By Eric Olson Water clarity can be such an important variable that affects our success regardless the time of year.  Walleye and sauger both can be affected by poor visibility.  On rivers in particular when heavy rains or sudden run off can dirty the water and create poor visibility, anglers have to make the adjustments [...]

Good North Dakota Fishing

By Doug Leier The late Dean Hildebrand was North Dakota Game and Fish Department director from 1996 through 2005 and he had a well-developed vocabulary of catch phrases and sayings. One description I heard repeatedly for years was his exclamation that, “We’re living in the good old days when it comes to hunting and fishing.” [...]

Smallmouth Bass Jigs

Our Outdoors: Smallmouth Bass Jigs By Nick Simonson Learning how to fish on the Sheyenne River in southeastern North Dakota during my late teens and early twenties allowed me the luxury to go after smallmouth bass from the first warm-up in early April until the fish really got going in May. Throughout the years, my [...]

New Fishing Gear for 2011

by Bob Jensen While there’s still lots of ice-fishing to do, open water fishing is getting closer every day. I’ve enjoyed the ice-fishing season, but am also looking forward to putting a boat in the water. When the time arrives that we’re casting a lure instead of dropping it through a hole in the ice, [...]

Shallow Water Fishing

By Jason Mitchell The fact that shallow water fishing is productive during the early part of the open water season is no secret.  This general pattern is fairly universal with both warm water and cool water fish that spawn in the spring.  Whether the targeted species is bass, walleyes, northern pike or even pan fish, [...]

Open Water Fishing

LOOKING FORWARD TO OPEN WATER FISHING by Bob Jensen Winter arrived in the Midwest early this year and has hung on pretty aggressively. Everything has looked clean and white for a good number of weeks, but now it’s time to move on. Don’t get me wrong, there’s still lots of ice-fishing to do. In fact, [...]

Following Smallies

By Nick Simonson It’s a jungle out there. Every man for himself. Greed is good. These mantras aptly describe the competitive drive in the world around us; natural laws that even mankind hasn’t rid from our collective psyche after millennia of becoming civilized. Whether it is in big business or the food web, one thing [...]

Topwater Bass Fishing

Top Water Fishing Lures By Nick Simonson I still remember the first time I watched a surface lure get inhaled and taken into the depths by a largemouth bass. It was a calm, sunny Saturday morning in late May and my buddy flung his Zara Spook about twenty yards off shore over a shallow flat. [...]

Soft Plastics for Bass

By Nick Simonson Fishing fast is a fun way of covering water and targeting active largemouth bass. Ripping crankbaits and burning spinnerbaits back to the boat triggers reaction strikes and puts a solid bend in the rod when largemouth are in a feeding mood. This fun-n-gun presentation also helps anglers key in on areas that [...]

Homemade Gypsy Jig

By Nick Simonson When I was just getting the hang of what worked and what didn’t on the water, I stumbled on what was, at the time to me, a miracle lure. It was a banana head jig with a fan-shaped skirt made from krystal flash called the Gypsi Jig. For that summer, it was [...]

Fishing Diary

By Nick Simonson There have been a lot of changes in my life over the past five years. I’ve lived in two states and three towns and have had six different jobs, with this one being the most consistent. In that time I’ve fished over 60 lakes and rivers, gaining some level of familiarity with [...]

President Obama Attacking Fishing Industry

Sport Anglers Alarmed by Proposed Obama Policy A controversy has erupted in the sport fishing community over a new federal management plan for oceans and Great Lakes waters. Recent opinion pieces circulating on the internet and reported on numerous radio stations have stoked the flames through revelations that the policy, if implemented, would prohibit recreational [...]

Catch and Release Fishing

‘Swimming Pools’ for Fish A Little Advice on Caring for Your Catch By Tony Roach Have you ever caught the same fish twice in a single day? How about the same fish two or three times inside a week? I’ll bet many of you have. Even on a massive fish factory like Mille Lacs in [...]

Building Fish Habitat

By Doug Leier More than 40 years ago the North Dakota Game and Fish Department, in an effort to create structure for fish and create artificial habitat within Heart Butte Dam (Lake Tschida) in Grant County, sunk some old car bodies into the reservoir. As you might expect, the practice of using car bodies for [...]

The First Cast Curse

By PJ Maguire   The lake was calm last summer when I took one of my younger cousins, Shawn, out fishing after dinner. In mid-July the wind typically dies down in the evening, making it perfect for casting top-water lures for Largemouth bass. There was a time in my life when top-water was my favorite [...]

Big Bang Baitfish

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson In cooler waters of May and June the shallows can seem almost bare. Nothing but the occasional waterboatman or roaming bluegill disturbs the water bordering shore. Then as summer peaks, it seems the shallows are suddenly alive and teeming with small fish, as if they exploded out of nowhere! This big [...]

Confidence Baits

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson   The woolly bugger is a pattern that rarely fails. Likewise, a ballhead jig with a curly-tail grub will catch nearly any fish. A red-and-white Daredevle spoon will with all certainty pull a pike out of any water that holds the species. These lures are time-tested producers; they are the ultimate [...]

Fishing Tackle Top Ten

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson Springtime means stocking the tackle box with jigs, spinners, twisters, spoons, crankbaits and more; usually more lures than I’ll ever need. However, if it came down to it, there is a handful of them I couldn’t go without. For whatever species I was pursuing, I would forsake all other jigs, rigs [...]

Catch & Release Tools

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson Catch and release works. Whether it’s preserving a viable fishery in a forty-acre bass lake or letting a trophy-caliber muskie swim back into the cabbage after an exciting battle, the mantra of C&R resounds stronger than ever through sport fishing circles. For those looking to preserve big fish it is easier [...]

The Coffee Tube

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson In the outdoors, it is tough to beat a hot cup of coffee in the morning. In the pre-dawn twilight of a fishing trip, a steaming hot Thermos-top-cup of java gears the senses up and gives an angler a reason to pause between casts, all the while adding a mountain-grown aroma [...]

The Fish I’ve Known

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson   We should all be so lucky to fish small waters, and fish the same small waters often. Time and time again Ixve said that our affinity with a certain river or small lake helps us take stock of the resource, to treat it respectfully and to see what a conservation [...]

The Heck with Tech

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson     Some of the best days I can recall involve zipping up the Sheyenne River in an old canoe using paddle power until I reached my favorite feeder creek. With a jig and minnow, I felt for the subtle tap of a walleye or the vicious strike of a smallmouth. [...]

The Texas Fishing Rig “Texas Rig”

Nick Simonson Summertime and the living’s easy. The fishing is pretty good too as predator species begin to enter a warm-weather pattern of eating, eating and more eating. Bass hide along weedlines, under docks and around stumps in wait for any prey to swim by. One of the most effective rigs for bass at this [...]

Fishing in May

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson   “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” This line, an eye-to-eye plea by Matthew Broderick as the title character in the 1986 film Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, sums up our very existence. For anglers, month of May moves [...]

The Rapala X-Rap

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson     Whether your treasure on the water is colored gold, bronze or silver, the X-Rap by Rapala (www.rapala.com) marks the spot for great fishing. My experience with crankbaits has been limited; being predominately a river angler has restricted my usual arsenal to jigs and soft plastics which are comparatively inexpensive [...]

Beginning Again

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson   The orange jig and twister shot out from the tip of my rod, driven by the laws of physics and anticipation. The gray Fireline in tow spiraled wildly like the contrail of a botched rocket launch. The lure hung in the air, suspended indefinitely in the blue slivers of sky [...]

Topwater Fishing

By Jon Mitzel Long-awaited May is a great time to enjoy catching fish on surface baits. Northern pike and largemouth bass are aggressive fish and will readily attempt to chase food on or near the surface. The action is tough to beat, and most hits are vicious in nature. What an exciting way to catch [...]

Hot Fishing Lures for 2007

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson Hang in there, it can’t snow forever. As if spring fever wasn’t bad enough, a fresh 16 inches of snow over the last week has put the “cabin” into “cabin fever.” But while nature-induced lockdown might dampen most spirits; anglers know that now is the time to stock up on tackle [...]

Summertime Bass Fishing Tips

Nick Simonson Slop, gunk, or matting, call it what you will, but by this time in the summer, the combination of weed tops and surface vegetation has sealed off water access for shoreline anglers and limited the area that boat anglers can work. But those anglers who overlook this green gobbledygook could also be passing [...]

Simple Bass Fishing Techniques

PJ Maguire The first step I took as a fisherman was from catching sunnies off the dock to casting for bass along the docks. It is true that bass are a sunfish, so in theory this is a logical step. Most of my friends, like me, first started serious fishing for bass and then transitioned [...]

Springtime River Smallmouth

By Nick Simonson     As the last few inches of ice fade from the shorelines of area rivers, it is next to impossible not to think about springtime fishing. It is even more difficult not to think of the hundreds of bronze flashes from springtime fishing trips in the past. In the land where [...]

Long Cast Minnow

By Nick Simonson Technology! Isn’t it grand? Today’s advancements have not only improved the way we fish, but the way we live life.Though GPS and sonar may be the first ideas in many people’s minds when it comes to fishing technology, today’s topic is a much simpler aspect of the sport, yet it is the [...]

Praise for Polarized Sunglasses

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson As I pulled up the trolling motor and hoped for a clean glide over the small sandy delta leading into a back bay on my favorite lake for Minnesota’s Bass Season opener, I was disappointed to not immediately see signs of fish ahead of the Grumman. My yellow lab, Gunnar, and [...]

Catch and Release 101

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson     A dead-weight tug on the end of my line signaled that the largemouth bass under the dock was indeed hungry. I swept the rod back and the four-pound fish rocketed up out of the water. She battled every foot of the way to my hand. I reached down, tweaked [...]

Extra Hooks Bring the Sting

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson     In one of the best Simpsons episodes, Moe uses a punch-absorbing Homer to relive his glory days as a boxer. But when Homer ends up having to fight the heavyweight champion, the all too Tyson-like Drederick Tatum, Moe searches through his bag of tricks to find the weapon that [...]

Freshen Up Your Skills

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson     The season for big fish has come! The snow is rapidly melting, the ice is weakening, and the fish are preparing for the spawn. It is a picture perfect time for spring angling. If you plan to take some photos of your angling success this openwater season, here are [...]

Largemouth Bass Ice Fishing

By Jerry Carlson of Ice Team       When it comes to winter time fishing, there is no question I spend most of my hours searching out crappies. I love the activity involved in catching these fish. I also enjoy the fact that I can be successful during the daylight hours without having to [...]

Smallie Streamers – Flies for Bass Fishing

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson Except for a few wily grayling in the cold running streams of northern Norway, few freshwater fish have fought as valiantly on the flyrod as the smallmouth bass of my home water. These fish, from late April through October on the Sheyenne River and others like it in the upper Midwest, [...]

Fishing Laydowns

Joe Zentner  Bank sloping trees that have fallen into the water, known as lay-downs, attract fish throughout the Midwest. Long-time anglers are keenly aware of the value of immersed trees. The primary cover choice of freshwater fish is, in fact, submerged wood. A lay-down is a tree that has fallen into the water and is [...]

Arbor Vital – Fishing Flooded Trees

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson I  think that I shall never see structure lovely as a tree. Pardon the take on Ms. Kilmer’s poem; let’s consider it the angler’s version. But timber – be it live on shore, a deadfall along a river or a man-made reef on a lake – is structure that all anglers [...]

Fishing Lures – What’s in a Name?

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson When it comes to marketing, a good lure needs a good name. No angler is going to buy lures called The Skunk, Zippo, or The Blanker. Lures must have two essentials to catch the attention of anglers. First they must catch fish, and second they must have a moniker to remember. [...]

The Legend of the Grumman Boat

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson The fisherman’s dictionary defines the word “boat” as a hole in the water into which money is thrown. Similar to a hunting dog, the price paid for a boat is rarely reflected in the purchase. There’s winterizing, summerizing, trailer repairs, motor tune ups, depth finders, rod racks, lure holders and much [...]

Fishing with Light Tackle

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson     Lighten up! If I had a nickel for every time I’ve been told that I’d be a rich man. However, there is one time no one has to tell me to lighten up and that is when I am angling for panfish, trout and finicky bass. The allure of [...]

Why Do I Fish?

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson Why do you fish? Now that is a question with as many answers as there are people to ask it to. And it is likely that anglers will have more than one response when posed with such an inquiry. I was asked this question recently, and all I could come up [...]

Best Bass Fishing Lures of Today

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson     Topwater fishing for bass is nothing new. Anglers have experienced the excitement of having bass explode on lures such as the Zara Spook, Rebel Pop-R, and pre-rigged surface plastics like the Bass Rat for decades. But recent revolutions in plastic baits have bass anglers buzzing at the tackle shop [...]

Oh Deer, it’s Smallie Time!

By Nick Simonson       While the tension mounts as you await this year’s deer application results (enjoy the next eight weeks), take some time to relax with the hardiest fish in our waters – the smallmouth bass. Just don’t expect your heart rate to get any lower. With a few simple items of [...]

In Pursuit of Rock Bass

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson     Recently, my fishing buddy Einar came for a visit, and in between largemouth and smallmouth bass, rainbow trout and walleye, there was one fish he hoped to tangle with that he had not landed in the states before and was not available to him in his home country of [...]

Top 10 Fishing Lures of All Time

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson Springtime means stocking the tackle box with jigs, spinners, twisters, spoons, crankbaits and more; usually more lures than I’ll ever need. However, if it came down to it, there is a handful of them I couldn’t go without. For whatever species I was pursuing, I would forsake all other jigs, rigs [...]

Smallmouth By the Numbers

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson     What a surprise! A stretch of warm spring days shook winter’s chill off some bronze scales and more than a week earlier than last year, I landed my first smallmouth bass. There’s no better time than now, during the prespawn, to search for big brown bass for some spring [...]

Free Fishing Log – Printable Fishing Log

Our Outdoors Nick Simonson “Putting together the fishing pieces of the puzzle” Fishing, no matter how good a person gets at it, is still the grandest puzzle of all. There are so many elements that have to be put into place such as weather, season, bait, lures, and so on. When looked at in hindsight, [...]

Carolina Rig Fishing

By Kevin Dahlke     The Carolina Rig is a technique that has been around for quite some time. It is used to cover an area quickly to find out what kind of structure you are fishing. Personally, I have put this technique on the back burner for the last number of years, but as [...]